Valentine For the Man
by ForMyValentineTwilight
Summary: Renesmee is celebrating her very first Valentines Day by making a Valentine for her man. Entry for the "2nd Annual For My Valentine" Contest.


**2nd Annual "For My Valentine"**

**A Twilight Love Story Contest**

**Title: Valentine For the Man**

**Rated: K+ to T**

**Pairing: Nessie**

**Summary: Renesmee is celebrating her very first Valentines Day by  
making a Valentine for her man.**

**For more information please see contest details at http://www(dot)fanfiction(dot)net/~formyvalentinetwilight**

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Esme set out the paint in two pans, white and red. Claire and I each had a paper heart as wide as we could reach in front of us. Mine was baby blue and hers was a lemony yellow. Claire stuck her fingers into the red paint and put a pair of hand prints on her heart. I watched her for a while. I knew what the paint was for; I'd been told we were making Valentines, but I still wasn't quite sure what I should do.

Next, Claire grabbed one of Esme's sponges, cut into a heart. She put a series of white hearts across the middle of the Valentine. I put two fingertips in each color and outlined my Valentine in alternating dots. She continued to play, using her fingers to spread paint to every corner of her heart and a bit on the table too. I couldn't do anything fine with my fingers or the sponges, but from Claire's efforts it seemed enthusiasm was the order of the day, not neatness.

Sure enough, that was when Claire reached across the table and slapped a hand-print on my heart. It was pink, a result of her spreading colors on her Valentine.

At first I was annoyed; she had ruined mine. I looked up at her, angry, but her smile was bright and she made more slapping motions with her hand. I looked at the hand on my Valentine. Then I put my hands into each color and turned her single hand into a sun radiating fingers. That looked better. Then I rubbed my hands together and, with my wrists joined, made two pink 'finger' hearts. I took a clean sponge and added more little hearts around these.

Claire seemed to be more satisfied with my piece now and was asking Esme to write on her drying Valentine. "Claire's Heart, For Quil," she said quite clearly.

"It will need to dry a bit more before I can write on it, dear," Grandmother explained.

"Mine's done," I announced.

"What do you want yours to say, Nessie?" Grandmother asked. I was planning to write on it myself once it was dry. I just shook my head for now.

"I want to make another, for Daddy," I requested. "Claire? Will you help?"

Claire smiled and came to my side of the table while Grandmother cut out another heart for us. This one was black. I frowned, that wasn't a very nice Valentine color. But as we put the white and red paint on, it was a much nicer contrast. I smiled broadly as my hands kept fighting with Claire's for paint and space to draw. Daddy's Valentine would be much less artistic than Jacob's, but much wetter. I had paint on the back of my hands as well as my palms. Claire had slapped my hand on more than one occasion, missing the Valentine entirely.

I put a hand to Claire's cheek to show her how much fun I was having and to thank her. She smiled at me and then put her hand on my face, smearing paint over my cheek and nose. I laughed louder and turned her ear white and her neck red. Claire laughed too, and I soon had hand prints all over my paint shirt and a few in my hair. Claire's hair was streaks of red and pink. I ran a finger down her nose leaving a white line there.

Grandmother finally thought we'd made just about enough of a mess. "Is it finished?" she asked.

I reached up and put a hand to her cheek too. She frowned at first. I showed her that I wanted to write on them later. I also showed her how happy I was. I thanked her for letting us make such a mess of her kitchen. It was so much fun!

She smiled then, "I'm glad you had fun, Nessie. Now I need to wash both of you before I return you to your mothers."

Claire and I made a wetter but less dirty mess in Grandmother's bathroom. She had given us bubbles and we got a little carried away blowing them at each other and attempting to make sculptures on each others heads. I showed Claire how to blow bubbles in the water and we turned into two motor boat kicking our way around the giant tub.

We were both down stairs with wet hair when Quil and Jacob arrived. Grandmother had used a gold glitter glue to write "Claire's Heart" across the top of her Valentine. A little lower, in slightly smaller letters, it read, "For Quil."

Claire gave Quil his Valentine right away. She held it proudly out to him, "For Quil!" she said loudly.

His expression was great to watch. There was a moment of shock and then a smile as warm and bright as any Jacob had ever given me. "Thank you, Claire! It's perfect! Are you sure you want to give your heart to me?" He knelt down to take the heart and she wrapped her arms tightly around his neck.

"All for Quil," she said quietly. Quil closed his eyes, hugging her back.

Jacob looked at me expectantly and I looked down. I blushed a little. I didn't want to give it to him yet. I wanted a chance to write on it first. He looked a little disappointed so I jumped into his arms to show him that I had made one, but it wasn't finished yet.

"I'll wait till the fourteenth then," he said with a smile.

Before returning to the cottage, I wrote two poems, one for Jacob and one for Edward. Grandmother read as I wrote and heard her choke once. Good, I was choosing the right words, the right thoughts. I glued them to the back of the hearts and planned to give them on Valentine's Day.

When I woke in the morning, I left Daddy's outside his door while he was still in bed with Mama. Then I put Jacob's on our doorstep, knowing he'd be coming to visit soon. I sat down at the piano and started plunking out Fur Elise. It was still difficult with my tiny fingers, but I was getting better. Daddy would add the chords and we might play some other pieces when he was ready to come out.

xoxoxox

Valentine's Day with Bella. Technically, it wasn't our first, just our first as husband and wife. Our first Valentine's Day I had spent ignoring the fact that a beautiful, intelligent, mysterious, very human woman was sitting next to me, stealing my every thought, just because she smelled far too good. The second she'd spent with Jacob Black, and I could never punish myself enough for that; I'd been an utter fool, breaking the heart of the woman I love, driving her inexorably into the arms of another man. This was 'our' first, and I was going to make her every wish, her every whim a reality.

Thinking on that I added new fervor to my kisses, intensified my touch and was rewarded with her gasp and moan. "Remember, you were going to shift your shield for me today. I want to know _exactly_ what you want," I teased her.

"Edward," she whispered and her voice made my thoughts fly. But this wasn't about what I wanted, and I pushed them away again.

It had been a tough decision, keep Renesmee for the day or impose on the family for time alone? While my hunger for Bella, in every way possible, had not diminished much at all yet, our daughter was so precious, growing and changing so quickly, so interesting to spend time with. Bella wanted to spend the day with her just as much as I did. It was her first Valentine's Day ever. So, we had decided to keep her for the morning. She would spend the night with my parents in their house and Bella and I would return to our unending night of love. A night that only been interrupted, not ended, in the six months since it had begun.

I heard Nessie start playing the piano and gave Bella one more kiss before we both dressed to face the world outside each others arms. Was there really a world outside Bella's arms? It was hard to see it sometimes. I opened the door and found a painted heart on the floor. I picked it up, showing it to Bella.

"Esme said she and Claire had made Valentines. I thought it was for Jacob though," Bella explained. She walked past me to listen and sit with Renesmee.

There were smears of red, pink and white hands across the entire heart. Her hands had obviously continued right off the edge of the paper. I couldn't resist smiling at the enthusiasm that would have gone into making this. It was also a permanent reminder of how tiny Renesmee's hands were. It would be even more dear next year when she had grown so much bigger.

I turned the heart over. It was apparently made of black paper, although there was very little black left on the painted side.

A Valentine for the Man

The Man who guards me from all harm  
The Man who loves me from tip to toe  
The Man who shares my hopes and dreams  
The Man who leads but can follow me too  
The Man who cares for my every need  
The Man who lights my days and warms my nights  
More than friend or brother,  
My Jacob

"Of course it was for Jacob," I grumbled to myself. I was disappointed. I loved my little girl so very much. It was impossible that I was a father, and yet here I was, with a child every bit as intelligent, beautiful and loving as her mother. That seemed nearly as impossible as that I had sired her. She certainly didn't need a father the way ordinary toddlers did, she was brilliant and physically capable, but she had shared so much with me. Our love of music and reading, medicine and science. She still turned to me for answers she couldn't readily find on her own. She was the daughter of my heart as much as my body.

And of course her heart belonged to Jacob. Now mine was broken. It shouldn't have been, but I had been jealous of Jacob for so long, for so many reasons. For the attention and love Bella gave him, for Renesmee's regard, for his humanity. Even as I drowned myself in these thoughts I heard the mind of the man who had stolen my baby, taken her heart on the day she was born, before. I growled very quietly.

But as I listened to his thoughts my anger faded.

_Wow, a Valentine for Edward. That's sweet. I wonder if she still has one for me? __This was the one she showed me yesterday.__ Nah, probably not. Daddy's the Man._ _She's one great little girl, Nessie. _Then I read the counter poem in his thoughts.

A Valentine for the Man

The Man who guards me from all harm  
The Man who loves me from tip to toe  
The Man who shares my hopes and dreams  
The Man who knows my mind and heart  
The Man who taught me right from wrong  
The Man who gave me life and limb  
More than Daddy or Father,  
My Edward.

She was every bit as loving as her mother. I should have remembered that. Of course her tiny heart was big enough for both of us. I smiled and walked to the door.

"Come in, Jacob." I greeted him warmly. He seemed a little surprised when I opened the door. He was even more surprised at the grin on my face. "I think there may have been a mix-up." I held out the Valentine with his name on the bottom.

_Nope, no mix up at all. I love you, Daddy. I love you, Jacob._


End file.
